Ridge planting of row crops has been developed to conserve soil and energy. Row crop seed planters are used to plant seeds, such as corn, beans, and sorghum, in the crest of longitudinal ridges in the seed bed. The ridges can be elongated rows that are maintained in the seed bed year after year. The trash and residue from the crop falls off the ridges and is collected between the rows. The ridges remain high and clear of trash thereby allowing the use of a row crop seed planter, such as the planter shown by Brass et al., in U.S. Pat. No. 4,009,668, to plant seeds along the crest of the ridges. These planters have transverse tool bars that are connected to the tractor with a hitch. The planter must be guided along the field with the tractor to maintain the seed planting units on the crest of the ridges. This requires constant and tedious attention of the operator of the tractor and is difficult to achieve. The guide and gauge wheel assembly of the present invention facilitates the proper alignment of the planting units with the crest of the ridges in the field when used in a ridge tillage agricultural practice.
Ridge tillage practices are not universally used in row crop agriculture. Row crop planters are used in the conventional tillage to plant the seeds. These planters utilize gauge wheels to maintain the proper position of the planter tool bar. The gauge and guide wheel assembly of the invention can be readily converted into side-by-side gauge wheels for conventional tillage planting.